


The Years Between

by somethingpants



Series: Dragons (Collective) [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:48:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24594790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingpants/pseuds/somethingpants
Summary: A collection of snapshots detailing the intervening years between Zuko's Banishment and the return of the Avatar.
Relationships: Zuko (Avatar)/Original Male Character(s)
Series: Dragons (Collective) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1776619
Comments: 2
Kudos: 46





	The Years Between

**Author's Note:**

> This work is part of a group of works, and you'll probably want to go read Love Amongst The Dragons if you haven't already, otherwise none of this will make very much sense. These are just snapshot scenes from the two years that Zuko is hunting the Avatar before Aang returns, and it will probably be updated sporadically and not necessarily in chronological order. You won't have to read this to read my other work!

When Zuko dreams, he dreams of fire. 

He’s always surrounded on all sides, walls of flame pressing in on him relentlessly. He can see figures behind them, fully adorned in battle armor, bending the bright orange blaze in tight formation. The Fire Lord is always at their center, staring impassively, his golden eyes piercing through the blanket of fire and smoke to stare into Zuko’s soul. 

He falls to his knees, he begs.

He can hear screaming not from his own throat, someone else beyond the curtain of flame crying out for mercy. Zuko remembers this from the real Agni Kai but, unlike then, the shouts don’t stop. 

The flame continue to encroach, wretched sobs filling the air as Zuko meets his father’s eyes, finds nothing but contempt and something saying that he deserves this.

Every night, Zuko lurches awake with tears in his eyes and a raw throat, a scream still caught there. The ghosts don’t leave him be once he’s awake, keep him from falling back asleep. He stares up at the ceiling, lying in his own freezing sweat, until the sun rises.

The routine is exhausting, leaving him even more irritable and short-tempered than usual. He can’t focus on his lessons, can’t eat, barely able to make it through the day without collapsing. 

Each nightmare feels like weakness personified, just more proof that he wasn’t- isn’t- fit for the responsibilities he was born into. More evidence that his father was entirely justified in his shame, his anger at Zuko’s behavior.

Tonight it’s a rush of cold air, not the nightmares, that wake him suddenly from sleep. They’ve been edging further and further south, the air growing cooler every day as the ship circles lazily about islands, keeping to already-conquered territories to avoid enemy ships. Even a firebender is not immune to the shock of the cold, hitting his bare back and making him hiss and tense, prepared to incinerate who or whatever opened the door.

It closes and a warm body presses up behind him in the bed roll, thin arms coming to wrap around his torso. Even if Zuko didn’t immediately recognize the hands that grasp tightly at his arms by touch alone, he would recognize the scent. Floury and sweet from making bread in the mornings, overlaid with the spices from dinner, mingled together like the food stands at a festival in the Fire Nation. Smoke and sugar, like their home. 

“Go back to bed, Sang,” Zuko grumbles, his voice too exhausted to be authoritative. Sang only tightens his grip, buries his nose in the nape of Zuko’s neck. “That’s an order.”

“Oh  _ please _ ,” Sang sighs, “As if I’ve ever obeyed an order in private. Say what you like, I’m tired of you shouting yourself awake every night. I won’t have it.”

“I’m  _ fine _ .”

Sang is quiet for a beat, lets out a shuddering breath. “You were screaming,” He whispers, his grip tightening. “I won’t listen to that again. I can’t.”

Zuko can hear the fatigue in his voice, wonders if Sang has also been kept up all night. If that day also haunts him, just from a different perspective. If the screams Sang hears in his own nightmares don’t come from his own throat. The prince settles begrudgingly, lets out a deep breath. Sang hums behind him, relaxing now that he knows he won’t just be pushed away and forced out of the room at any moment. 

Sang occasionally jokes that Zuko is always making fire inside, radiating a ‘truly awful’ amount of heat, but the same can be said for the cook. Even through the thin fabric that Sang wears to bed each night, Zuko can feel the warmth emanating from him. He feels the moment that Sang drops off, his grip on Zuko’s arms going limp and his mouth going slack on Zuko’s shoulder. 

The room heats up slowly, the comforting pressure at his back lulling the prince into a dreamless sleep.

* * *

  
  


Zuko wakes in the early morning hours to Sang dabbing at his neck with a cloth. He shifts and looks up to see Sang looking embarrassed, hair askew in a way Zuko rarely sees. Sang is very careful to be impeccably put together during the day.

“What?” He asks, because Sang won’t look at him, his good eye on the ceiling. “What were you doing?”

“I...drooled a bit,” Sang says softly, cheeks red. “On your neck. I was wiping it off. You weren’t supposed to wake up.”

“What time is it?”

Sang rises from the bed roll, moving a bit awkwardly around the unfamiliar furnishings and opening the door a crack. Zuko hears him ask a passing guard the same question, ducking back in and shutting the door to the cool air outside. “Just before sunrise. You let me sleep in, breakfast is going to be late.”

“How did I  _ let _ you sleep in?” Zuko grouches, rubbing at his eyes. “You wake yourself up every morning.”

“I’ll have you know the guards do it. If you didn’t let yourself sleep half the day away, they’d wake you up, too.”

“Sunrise is not ‘half the day’.”

Sang is brushing his fingers through his own hair, fixing Zuko with an unimpressed look, although something underneath it is undeniably fond, “You don’t have to let the sun dictate when you sleep. You’re not a bird.”

“Go away,” He groans, throwing a pillow at the other boy. Sang dodges it with a laugh, kicking it back in Zuko’s direction. 

“I’ll see you at breakfast,” He chuckles, tying his hair up out of his face. 

Zuko can clearly see the scar, smaller than his own but more concentrated. The skin around Sang’s eyelid is an angry red, almost black, the flesh wrinkled and frail. He wears an eyepatch around the ship, makes terrible pirate jokes whenever possible and says “aye” if Zuko gives him an order on deck. 

His uncle finds it all very hilarious. Zuko just feels guilty, but also a sense of resolve. Like when he sees his own scar.

He very much wants to see Sang in the gardens again.

“All right,” Zuko murmurs. “I have to change, get out.”

Sang huffs at him, kicks his leg softly with a socked foot, before he finally turns and leaves, “Don’t be late!”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” The prince groans, tempted for the first time in months to just go back to sleep. 


End file.
